Game 74: Long Arms, Huge Win

Sunday

Mar 30, 2014 at 12:01 AMMar 30, 2014 at 3:11 AM

Blue Jackets center Artem Anisimov is every bit of 6-4, but he has the arms of an NBA rebounder. This man could drive from the back seat, tie his shoes without bending over, pluck the fruit that only giraffes evolved to eat.

Last night, those gangling, cartoonish appendages played a huge role in a momentous road win for the Blue Jackets, 3-2 in overtime over the Carolina Hurricanes before 16,714 in PNC Arena. Anisimov made a world-class play along the boards to maintain possession, then feed the puck across the high slot to Ryan Johansen for the power play game-winner at 2:40 of OT.

"It was all Arty," Johansen said. "He did all the work to get the puck. All I had was put it on net and hope for the best. I was watching him do his thing there - amazing - and I just told myself to keep skating, to get there. He put the puck right there. I mean, right there. Just perfect."

There was great synergy on this night.

Anisimov scored his 20th goal of the season earlier in the game. Johansen scored ...

Blue Jackets center Artem Anisimov is every bit of 6-4, but he has the arms of an NBA rebounder. This man could drive from the back seat, tie his shoes without bending over, pluck the fruit that only giraffes evolved to eat.

Last night, those gangling, cartoonish appendages played a huge role in a momentous road win for the Blue Jackets, 3-2 in overtime over the Carolina Hurricanes before 16,714 in PNC Arena. Anisimov made a world-class play along the boards to maintain possession, then feed the puck across the high slot to Ryan Johansen for the power play game-winner at 2:40 of OT.

"It was all Arty," Johansen said. "He did all the work to get the puck. All I had was put it on net and hope for the best. I was watching him do his thing there - amazing - and I just told myself to keep skating, to get there. He put the puck right there. I mean, right there. Just perfect."

There was great synergy on this night.

Anisimov scored his 20th goal of the season earlier in the game. Johansen scored his 30th goal of the season to give the Blue Jackets the win and their first lead of the night all at once. It was the Blue Jackets' 18th road win of the season, a new franchise record.

Matt Calvert also scored for the Blue Jackets, his second goal in as many nights, and back-up goaltender Curtis McElhinney had 25 saves for his 10th win.

The Blue Jackets needed this win. A loss here and a bit of worry begins to gather in their ears and minds. As it stands, they solidified their spot in the Eastern Conference wild-card position.

The Jackets are 7th in the East. Detroit, which beat Toronto, remains in 8th. The Maple Leafs and Washington Capitals, who lost to Boston, fell two points behind the Blue Jackets and Red Wings for the wild-cards.

"A credit to the guys," Blue Jackets coach Todd Richards said. "Under tough circumstances, coming in here after playing an emotional game last night (vs Pittsburgh), the guys really put it on the line.

"A lot of what they created was self-inflicted by us, in terms of some turnovers and some of the play in our own zone. But the want and the will and the compete was there tonight."

The Blue Jackets never led until Johansen's goal in OT, but they only trailed for 3:07 of the game. That's how quickly they answered the Hurricanes 1-0 and 2-1 leads.

"It speaks to the character I think we have in this room," Blue Jackets defenseman Dalton Prout said. "We didn't panic; we didn't change our game. We just kept going and trusted the system and trusted each other."

The game dragged well into the second period with no score and into the third period before either was whistled for a penalty.

The Hurricanes took a 1-0 lead on Jeff Skinner's goal at 16:29 of the second period, a goal fueled a pair of turnovers in the Blue Jackets' end. Carolina's Riley Nash pressured Nikita Nikitin into coughing up the puck in the corner, then used his left skate to wrest it away from David Savard only seconds later.

With both defensemen in the corner and the puck in the slot - Nash made a nifty pass to Skinner -- the Jackets were in deep trouble. Skinner fired, got his own rebound and fired top shefl.

But only 2:17 later, Calvert jumped on a Skinner turnover in the Hurricanes' zone and beat Khudobin with a wrister to make it 1-1. It was an unassisted goal, and it as Calvert's ninth of the season.

When the Canes took a 2-1 lead at 6:38 of the third -- Loktionov, again from Nash -- the Blue Jackets came right back 50 seconds later to tie it.

Nathan Horton, who switching lines with Corey Tropp, sent a soft shot in on Hurricanes goaltender Anton Khudobin from the right circle, but Anisimov used his arms to gather the puck, leverage it, and spin to his back hand. Khudobin tried to cover the near post, but Artem's follow beat him to the near post. it was 2-2.

Anisimov's most impressive play was saved for OT.

With the Blue Jackets on a 4-on-3 power play – their first man-advantage of the night – Anisimov gained the zone along the left wall, absorbed a hit by Carolina's Andrej Sekera and used his reach to gather the puck, and fire a perfect pass across the high slot to Johansen.

"Arty's got that reach," Johansen said. "Like, I've got long arms, and his are even longer than mine. Came in handy right there."

Johansen gathered the puck and snapped a wrister than skidded through Khudobin's pads.

"That's a great effort and a great play by Arty right there," Richards said. "To spin and take the hit, and to make that pass – perfect pass, right on the tape – that's big-time."

Side dishes:

-- Johansen is only the third Blue Jackets' player to hit 30 goals in a season. Rick Nash did it seven times; Geoff Sanderson did it twice. "Keep watching," Richards said. "Maybe he'll hit 35 by the end of the season."

-- Khudobin stopped 46 of 47 shots vs. Columbus on March 18 in Nationwide, a 3-1 Carolina win. Tonight he had 29 saves.

-- When the Blue Jackets played in Carolina on Jan. 11, they went the entire game -- a 3-2 loss -- without getting a power play. Tonight, it took until the OT before they got a power play chance. Jiri Tlusty was dinged for delay of game (closing paw on puck) at 1:54 of OT. Only 44 seconds later, Johansen scored.

-- Richards switched his lines up right from the start of the game. Nathan Horton, who has struggled mightly, was dropped to the third (second?) line with Anisimov at center and Nick Foligno on the left wing. Corey Tropp came back into the lineup at right wing on Johansen's line, with rookie Boone Jenner on the left. R.J. Umberger was a healthy scratch for the third time in six games.

-- Anisinov had a game-high six shots on goal.

-- The Blue Jackets are off on Sunday. They'll return to practice on Monday.

-- Aaron Portzline

aportzline@dispatch.com

twitter: aportzline

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